“Well, you must admit that you haven’t
shown any particular desire to make yourself agreeable,”
she pointed out.

He turned suddenly upon her.

“I am a fool, I know,” he declared bitterly.
“I’m an awkward, nervous, miserable fool,
my own worst enemy as they say of me in the Mess,
turning the people against me I want to have like me,
stumbling into every blunder a fool can. I’m
the sort of man women make sport of, and you’ve
done it for them cruelly, perfectly.”

“Captain Griffiths!” she protested.
“When have I ever been anything but kind and
courteous to you?”

“It isn’t your kindness I want, nor your
courtesy! There’s a curse upon my tongue,”
he went on desperately. “I’m not
like other men. I don’t know how to say
what I feel. I can’t put it into words.
Every one misunderstands me. You, too!
Here I rode up to you this afternoon and my heart
was beating for joy, and in five minutes I had made
an enemy of you. Damn that fellow Lessingham!
It is all his fault!”

Without the slightest warning he brought down his
hunting crop upon his horse’s flanks.
The mare gave one great plunge, and he was off, riding
at a furious gallop. Philippa watched him with
immense relief, In the far distance she could see
two little specks growing larger and larger.
She hurried on towards them.

“Whatever did you do to Captain Griffiths, Mummy?”
Nora demanded. “Why he passed us without
looking down, galloping like a madman, and his face
looked—­well, what did it look like, Helen?”

Helen was gazing uneasily along the sands.

“Like a man riding for his enemy,” she
declared.

CHAPTER XXVII

Philippa and Helen looked at one another a little
dolefully across the luncheon table.

“I supposes one misses the child,” Helen
said.

“I feel too depressed for words,” Philippa
admitted.

“A few days ago,” Helen reminded her companion,
“we were getting all the excitement that was
good for any one.”

“What with Henry and Mr. Lessingham both away,”
Helen continued, “and Captain Griffiths not
coming near the place, we really have reverted to
the normal, haven’t we? I wonder—­if
Mr. Lessingham has gone back.”

“I do not think so,” Philippa murmured.

Helen frowned slightly.

“Personally,” she said, with some emphasis,
“I hope that he has.”

“If we are considering the personal point of
view only,” Philippa retorted, “I hope
that he has not.”

Helen looked her disapproval.

“I should have thought that you had had enough
playing with fire,” she observed.